Bridging the gap between an urban population and the wildlife we love.

The world continues to urbanise. According to the Population Reference Bureau, the developed nations of the world are 74% urban, and it is expected that by 2050, 70% of the entire world will be ‘urban’. Besides all the other consequences, people’s connection to nature will become more and more distant. With more people living in concrete jungles, a faster pace of life and a barrage of things competing for their attention, we cannot expect that nature, wildlife protection, ocean sustainability, et cetera will be high on the list of their priorities. Other than when the most sensational of news stories are released, how many of them will even think about wildlife, let alone take any personal steps that would make a difference to its survival?

If these are the people who define consumer behaviour and impact policy decisions, they are the ones who will also unwittingly drive the wildlife-conservation agenda. The conservation sector must therefore make a more concerted effort to connect with city dwellers and to do so, understand the motivations and desires of the greater public.

The good news is that despite the grander evidence against it, people do love animals. As children, we are surrounded by animals. Many of our favourite books, movies, clothes, and toys are associated with animals. Even as adults, 163 million of us have watched a video of a panda clinging to its caretaker, 100 million of us went to see Jungle Book, and 700 million more of us visited zoos last year. Marketers play into our love of animals and use the sympathetic or iconic nature of animals on a massive scale in advertising and branding.

If you threw practicality out the window, the most impactful thing you could do to convert that love of animals into a love of conservation would be to airlift those hundreds of millions of people into the Amazon, Serengeti, or Alaskan wilderness for a week. While the experience wouldn’t make all of them conservationists, it would certainly change the way they thought about the importance of nature.

Given this impossibility, the next best thing is to bring nature to them and entice them to explore more within their own means. Shows like BBC Planet Earth or Wild Kratts do a fantastic job of revealing the awesomeness of nature in a way that most everyone appreciates.

But TV shows are still a passive experience where the viewer takes in what he/she is being shown.

Our work at Internet of Elephants is to supplement this type of programming with games about wildlife that can actively be played every day. Our goal is to get people to think about wildlife for five minutes every day and convert the urban world into wildlife addicts. Read the rest of this entry »

One year ago, I launched the Facebook page “I fucking love biodiversity” (IFLB) with a post here on ConservationBytes. My goal was to get people talking about biodiversity in a positive and light-hearted way (absolutely no ‘doom and gloom’). Today, IFLB now has about 17500 fans/followers across three social media platforms. It has been an amazing experience.

I will start by admitting that I created IFLB under the assumption that “if you build it, they will come”. I thought a catchy name, goodwill and a few bells and whistles would land me a huge audience. I was wrong. It took some very serious work. And IFLB is still pretty small in the global social-media landscape.

Gladly, I don’t have to manage IFLB by myself. I have a crack team of admins that share the load. Kudos go to Laure Cugnière, Phoebe Maund, Lydia Tiller and Romina Henriques and our own in-house designer, Hannah Conduit, all of whom work on a totally volunteer basis. Thanks everyone – IFLB wouldn’t be possible without you.

During this last year, I estimate we have invested in IFLB the equivalent of nine working weeks to put out 2-3 posts every single day (yes, xmas and New Years included). That was the first lesson I learned: being part of an effort like this requires serious dedication. Not only because you need to find the most interesting content and the best photos to go with it, but because you also need to ensure all photos have copyright information, that what you are posting is not the result of Photoshop wizardry and of course, that your fans’ comments and messages don’t go unanswered. Read the rest of this entry »